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T O P I C R E V I E W

Spaceflyer

Which astronauts were assigned for Apollo 18, Apollo 19 and Apollo 20?

Cougar20

Someone correct me if I'm wrong, but on the rotation Deke Slayton had setup, wouldn't Gordon's back up crew from Apollo 15 on 18, Fred Haise's from Apollo 16 on 19, and Bean's back up crew on 17 be on 20.

Hart Sastrowardoyo

"Deke" has the listings. But it was Gordon-Brand-Schmitt for Apollo 18; Haise stated it was himself, Pogue (CMP) and Carr (LMP) who had trained for four months.

As for Apollo 20, that has been the subject of much debate and speculation. But I've found that, with a few exceptions, the CMP of a mission, if back in rotation, would be a backup 3 missions later, and then an LMP 3 missions after that (which is why Deke said Collins would have commanded Apollo 17, if asked.) Therefore:

CMP Apollo 7 - Eisele - would have been on Apollo 13

Apollo 8 - Lovell - would have been on Apollo 14, and was in fact assigned to that mission before switching with Shepard

Apollo 9 - Scott - became LMP on Apollo 15

Apollo 10 - Young - LMP on Apollo 16

Apollo 12 - Gordon - would have been LMP on Apollo 18

Apollo 14 - Roosa was the CMP. Would have he become the LMP on Apollo 20? They broke the "rule" on Apollo 19. As Apollo 20 would have been the last moon mission, would they have let the astronauts who later went to Skylab — say Weitz and Lousma (who was Group 5 and thus had "seniority,") Kerwin, Garriott or Gibson have one of the slots? What about Lind or McCandless, the other Group 5 members who hadn't flown?

carmelo

Apollo 17: Cernan, Evans, Engle;

Apollo 18: Gordon, Brand, Schmitt

Apollo 19: Haise, Pogue, Carr

Apollo 20 Roosa (or Conrad), Weitz, Lousma or Roosa, Lousma, Lind

albatron

Weitz and Lousma have both confirmed to me they were never (at least advised or aware of) in the rotation for Apollo 20, and certainly not 18 or 19.

This came about with the patch going around eBay for Apollo 20. A nice colorful patch but Lousma felt it historically inaccurate. He had no problem with it, just felt it was inaccurate.

carmelo

The patch, it's clearly a fake. Lousma on Apollo 18 (likely CMP) is highly probable (on the web in all list of crews for cancelled Apollo mission to 18 at 20, Lousma is CMP or LMP for Apollo 20).

dtemple

If you are the superstitious type, then history happened the best possible way in regard to the cancelation of Apollo 19. It would have been the 13th manned Apollo mission with Fred Haise of Apollo 13 as its commander.

Anyone who suffers from triskaidekaphobia should be thankful this one did not fly!

Matt T

And don't forget that Dick Gordon's Apollo 18 crew would have been the thirteenth Apollo crew, and Gordon would've been the thirteenth moonwalker...

Hart Sastrowardoyo

And "Richard Gordon" has 13 letters. Doggone those Majik-12 operatives...

Headshot

I wonder what Deke Slayton would have done if Schmitt had insisted on flying with Gordon and Brand and refused to fly with Cernan and Evans. As I recall, Schmitt was the only scientist who had started any type of real training. It might have caused real problems for NASA to start training another scientists to fly with Cernan and Evans. Time and money were something that Apollo could not afford to waste as the program was winding down.

Delta7

If Schmitt were that insane, I can envision Slayton saying "okay" and Joe Engle today being a veteran of three missions instead of two.

Headshot

NASA Headquarters had decreed that a scientist fly in the LMP (Engle's) spot. I do not believe that Schmitt knew about the edict, but Slayton did and he had to follow management's instructions.

So Engle was not going to be on that flight period.

Delta7

The way I read it NASA management wanted Schmitt specifically, because of his lunar geology bona fides. He was trained and ready to go. I do not believe, however, that they would have delayed the mission in your scenario in order to select and train another scientist if it wasn't going to be Schmitt. Flying Schmitt on Apollo 17 instead of Engle made sense and was easily done. Insisting another scientist be brought up to speed and the time and effort that would entail, would not have in my opinion.

Robert Pearlman

Schmitt, in my recent interview with him, said that NASA HQ was insisting on him flying on Apollo 15 at the time Apollo 18 was canceled. Slayton fought against that because he wanted Schmitt to serve on a backup crew first.

Schmitt acknowledges that that was the right thing to do because serving as backup taught him how to fly Apollo. He wouldn't have been (as) prepared to go if slipped directly into a prime crew.

Given Slayton's reasoning, and Schmitt's experience, I think it would be dubious at best that Slayton would have agreed to putting another scientist on the prime crew without first a rotation on a backup crew.

Headshot

Getting back to my original question/point.

I am still curious to know what Slayton could have done had Schmitt demanded that Gordon and Brand fly with him. Schmitt had (although he did not know it) an amazing amount of leverage. I wonder if Slayton would have dumped Cernan and Evans had Schmitt backed him against a wall?

Although we will never know for certain, it is still interesting to speculate.

robsouth

Is it in Schmitt's nature to do something like that? When he was chosen ahead of Engle he must have been aware of his unique position and he did go to the top to push for a farside landing. If he had gone to NASA management over the heads of Cernan and Slayton and asked for Gordon and Brand to be chosen, I wonder what they would have done.

Headshot

I do not believe that it was in Schmitt's nature to do something like that ... under normal circumstances.

His loyalty to Gordon and Brand was superceded by his desire to be the LMP on a lunar landing mission. Just like Cernan's loyalty to Engle ended when he realized his being commander of a lunar landing mission might be in jepordy.

However, Schmitt, had he known that the remaining Apollo 17 crew choices essentialy revolved around him, could have made Deke Slayton's life very interesting.

carmelo

For Apollo 19, Haise would have been commander also if Apollo 13 was a success? In other words can Haise go twice on the moon?

All "what if" on Apollo 19 and 20 tell that on 19 the crew would have been Haise, Pogue, Carr, and on 20 Roosa, Lousma, Lind (or Roosa, Weitz, Lousma), but again, if Apollo 13 had been a success, is not more probable Ken Mattingly (or John Swigert as the case) as commander on 19?

BBlatcher

According to Andrew Chaikin's 'A Man on the Moon,' Schmitt asked Dick Gordon to let him talk to Slayton. Gordon said no. Schmitt did it anyway, pleading to keep Gordon and him together. Obviously that didn't work.

As to Haise getting to walk on the Moon twice, that was the plan before 18-20 were canceled. Supposedly the rule was that Commanders couldn't go twice (Pete Conrad pushed for it and was flatly told no), but LMP's could, in order to take advantage of their lunar experience. Not sure why Commanders weren't reused, but I'm guessing it just seemed unfair to command two lunar landing missions with so many astronauts in the program.

So yeah, had everything worked out, Haise and possibly Ed Mitchell could have walked on the moon twice in 19 and 20. But Mitchell is a question mark, as some higher ups weren't totally happy with him, so it might have gone to Roosa. It's all speculation.

I am curious why Alan Bean, the LMP of Apollo 12, didn't seem to be in line to Command a later Apollo mission. I'm guessing there was no way in hell Dick Gordon, teh CMP of 12, was going to let that happen! But who knows.

Duke Of URL

All of this infighting doesn't seem to be in character for these gentlemen. There were three Skylab missions, ASTP for a total of 12 seats in the pipeline. Also, was the shuttle on the boards? There wouldn't any reason to expect the delays that slipped the first flight to 1981.

Skylon

It depends when you were talking about. At the time the last Apollo crews were named Skylab was the only certainty looking ahead. ASTP remained hypothetical until 1972 I believe. I don't think I ever saw any expectations for Shuttle flights to begin earlier than 1979. Even that would be a substantial wait for a flight.

Delta7

quote:Originally posted by BBlatcher:Supposedly the rule was that Commanders couldn't go twice (Pete Conrad pushed for it and was flatly told no), but LMP's could, in order to take advantage of their lunar experience.

It's likely the original plan, up until three days before Apollo 13's launch, was for Ken Mattingly to rotate into the backup Apollo 16 CDR slot, then on to CDR of Apollo 19. It must have added greatly to Mattingly's extreme frustration when he was grounded, as I'm sure he could do the math before then.

Had Apollo 13 succeeded with Swigert as CMP, AND had Apollos 18 and 19 not been cancelled, would he have gone on to command a lunar landing crew in Mattingly's place? We'll never know...

carmelo

Swigert? I don't think.

Is probable that if CDR could not go twice on the moon, LMP could. So Fred Haise is probably the man that lost the moon twice.